Saving Commander McGarrett
by Shoshanna Elise
Summary: "I know you're lying to me, Steven. Catherine has less people who care about her than you have fingers on one hand." Steve/Cath with plenty of good ol' H50 bromance.
1. Chapter 1

It was surprising for Catherine to realize that she had consistently, if intermittently, woken up next to the same man for the last six years. Although she had told countless suitors that she had neither the time nor the means nor the will to be in a relationship, it seemed that she had ended up in one anyway, without even realizing it.

McGarrett slept soundly next to her as she mulled it all over. This couldn't be a relationship. They had never said it was, so it couldn't be. Did he think it was? No. He couldn't. This was Steve. He didn't do relationships, and that was the very reason this worked.

It was a working relationship, a barter system of sorts. She had connections, he had connections, and when either of them needed help they could ask for it, and then the favor would be repaid by...connecting. And though their plans didn't always pan out as intended, they managed to stay pretty even. Even though she had been seduced out of a few promised dinner dates.

"Lieutenant," McGarrett called to her sleepily. "It appears to me that you are thinking much too hard about something."

Catherine tried to push the analyzing part of her mind back for a bit. "Well good morning to you, too, Commander," she greeted him, sliding back down under the covers to face him. "You should be careful when you watch a girl while she thinks," she smiled at him. "You might see some things you'd rather not."

"I can handle it," McGarrett claimed, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her close to him.

Catherine touched his face as she laughed a little at his bravado. "Oh, I'm sure you could."

"I can. I'm a SEAL. I can do anything." He was still partially asleep, and was trying to bury his face in her hair even as he spoke. "Tell me."

"I'm afraid that information is classified," Catherine said, trying to joke it off.

Still buried in her raven-black hair, Steve inhaled deeply. "I suppose that's what I get for being in the reserves," he finally sighed, settling himself further against Catherine's skin. In a moment, he was snoring lightly again.

Catherine smiled to herself. Despite the criticism she always received from family members who so desperately wanted her to fall in love, Catherine rather enjoyed what she had with Steve. Though it was, in all technicality, an open relationship, they were both acutely aware of the fact that they were also incredibly exclusive. Catherine had watched Steve around others for years and had seen that time and time again, the side of him that he showed her was one that very few other people got to see, if any.

Right now was the perfect example-she was sure that no one but her knew that Commander Steve McGarrett liked a good morning cuddle. And at that, she couldn't help but laugh.

Steve woke up again at the sound of her quiet laughter, but didn't move. "Now I _have_ to know what you're thinking about," he ordered from the crook of her neck. "What's so funny?"

Catherine sighed to stop her quiet fit of laughter. "You, actually."

At that, he looked up at her, his face a mere inch from hers. "What did I do this time?"

"Nothing," she said with her trademark genuine smile. "Well, nothing new," she explained. "I was just thinking that it's...you know...it's funny that you like to cuddle."

Steve smiled sleepily at that, returning to his place in the crook of Catherine's neck, placing a few kisses there. "I can't help it," he defended. "You're so pretty."

"I'm sure you say that to all the girls," Cath retorted.

"No… I don't cuddle with any of the other girls."

"Because they're not as pretty?" Cath asked, trying to follow his logic.

"Exactly. They're not as pretty," he began, kissing behind her ear. "They're not as warm," he placed another kiss to her throat. "They're not as fun." Another kiss, on her collarbone. "They're not as smart." Another, further down.

Catherine was beginning to lose the thread of the conversation, focused on his lips as they traveled across her skin. Her body always reacted to his, regardless of whether that was what she wanted or not. Her fingers knotted instinctively in his short hair as she decided to just enjoy it.

"And I don't like them nearly as much as I like you," Steve finished the sentence she had lost complete track of, bringing his face back up to hers. In their classic way, he spoke to her with his lips just a breath away from hers. "You, Cath, beat them all without even trying."

He then kissed her on the lips, like he did so often. She kissed him back, slowly pulling him close to her and deepening the kiss...but her mind raced as she did so. They began to breath together, around each other, through each other, as Steve shifted on top of her and ran his hands over every part of her he could reach.

Catherine was lost in the feeling of it all, again losing the thoughts that had tried to inch their way into her mind. But as Steve openly adored her, showering her with affection, Cath began to think that she should say something in reply to his compliments.

She had always been privy to thanking him in other ways, but she had the feeling that his words this morning warranted an actual response.

Steve's hands were in her hair and his lips were working that one spot on her neck that turned her legs to jell-o but she forced herself to think. Think actual thoughts. Say something.

But nothing came to her. She didn't know what to tell him. She suddenly began to realize that she had nothing to say to him.

Slowly, Steve caught on to her waning interest. He placed a few more kisses on her lips and looked her knowingly in the eyes. "What?" he asked gently, but he smiled at her. "You have your analyst face on."

Her eyes refocused as she shook her head to clear her mind. "Sorry."

"What is it, Cath?" he asked again.

She tried to force a smile and considered lying to him. But as he looked at her with searching eyes, she couldn't. "Those were very nice things to say, Sailor."

He grinned boyishly at her. "It's the truth." But he saw it on her face that that wasn't all. "Catherine. What's wrong?"

She hesitated again and reconsidered lying. It had been such a nice morning, and she really, _really_ didn't want to ruin it. She wanted them to stay here in bed-all day, if that were an option-and just enjoy themselves like they always did. But she couldn't lie. She never lied to him, and that was another reason this thing they had worked so well.

With a sigh, Catherine pressed her hands lightly to Steve's shoulders, signaling for him to get off of her. Suddenly, as she thought about what to say, Catherine felt sweaty and uncomfortable and she just wanted to run away.

"How long have you felt like that?" she asked as Steve retreated to his own side of the bed.

"Like what?"

"What you said about me. That I beat out all the other girls?"

"Since our first weekend in Coronado," he answered automatically, as if surprised by the fact that he needed to tell her something like that. "What, does that bother you?"

"Bother me? No, of course not. It's just kind of surprising. Our first drunken encounter in Coronado was almost six years ago, Steve."

"I wasn't that drunk," Steve admitted.

"Neither was I," she said offhandedly, obviously feeling there was a much more pressing matter. Catherine sat up, bringing the sheets with her. "Are you trying to tell me that you've been holding a candle for me for the last six years?"

"Holding a candle implies that there was some kind of conscious effort involved," Steve defended. "I wasn't pining after you, Cath, if that's what makes you uncomfortable. I just, you know, haven't met anyone else quite like you."

Catherine had to look away. She had to leave. She didn't like this conversation. She wished she had lied. "I should go," she said quickly, getting up and taking the sheets with her. She didn't want him looking at her. Didn't want him to see her. Not like that.

"Catherine..." he tried, but she was already in the bathroom with the door shut and locked.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Danny had thrown more than one analyzing glance his way before finally speaking to him.

"So, Steven, how is your friend Catherine?" Danny asked as if he were asking Grace how her day at school was.

"She's fine, Danny. Can we just not talk?" Steve answered curtly.

"Sure, yeah, that's fine. We can _not_ talk. We can _not_ talk about how today you are much more uptight than you usually are when your lady friend is on leave. That's what we can _not_ talk about."

"What does my demeanor matter to you, Danny, huh?" Steve asked, never taking his eyes off the road.

Danny just laughed. "Oh, you did _not_ just go there, my friend. Your demeanor is _incredibly_ important to my _safety_. I have to break you down, head-to-toe, every morning, to see if I can predict whether or not I might die today. That, Steven, is what your demeanor matters to me. A whole hell of a lot. So, if you could just get over why you don't want to discuss what happened and spill it, that would put me very much so at ease."

McGarrett finally sighed, giving in. "Things with Cath are weird."

"Weird how? 'Weird' tells me nothing," Danny pried.

"Ok, well, last night was great. I picked her up at the base, I took her out to dinner, then we went back to my place for a couple of beers, and then-"

"-Your night proceeded as usual, yes I get it, thank you, Casanova."

"Right. And everything was fine. But this morning, I wake up, and she's deep in thought about something but doesn't want to talk about it. Which is fine; I've been there. So I don't press it and we're back to laughing about stuff and having fun and then I guess I misspoke, somehow. Totally scared her off."

"Whoa whoa whoa," Danny held up a hand. "Rewind. What exactly did you say that freaked her out?"

"Well, it seems that we had two very different ideas about what our...thing...that we had was. Somehow, we just weren't on the same page anymore."

Danny nodded knowingly. "Ah, I see. Pretty Navy girl wants some commitment and the Commander turns her down, huh? That's harsh, Steve," he laughed. "Even for you."

"First of all, she's a Lieutenant with a higher security clearance than you can even wrap your mind around, and second, you've got it wrong, and third, you've got it backwards."

Danny stared at him for a moment, processing. "No way," he said in disbelief. "No way!" He excitedly smacked Steve on the shoulder. "Where is she? Right now. I want to shake her hand. Someone has, miraculously, caused Steven Jonathan McGarrett to act and feel like a human!"

"She's probably back on the Enterprise already, Danny," Steve said, laughing at Danny's reaction to the whole situation. "I'm telling you, she _booked_ it out of my house. She called herself a cab and everything."

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"The gods have smiled on us today," Danny said as he entered the commander's office without knocking. "No one has killed anyone yet. Which means you get to tell me all about your little conversation with Catherine this morning."

"Do I get to have any sort of private life that you don't know about, Danny?"

"Yeah, that will start happening when you butt out of _my_ life."

"So, never, then?"

"Exactly, now talk."

"There honestly isn't much to tell, Danny. I told her she was beautiful, and she asked if I said that to all the girls, and I said no, that I didn't think anyone was as pretty as she was and that I liked her more than I liked anyone else." He shrugged. "That was it."

"And she just...ran away after that?"

"Pretty much."

"Okay," Danny said with a certain finality, pulling out his phone.

"What are you doing?"

"I am sending out a memo to Five-0 saying not to contact Commander McGarrett because he is taking care of some very pressing and top-secret matters. There, done. I sent it to you, too. Now go. Go talk to her about this."

"Why are you being so pushy, Danny? I'm a grown man, I can take care of my relationships myself."

"Obviously not. And I like Catherine, she brings out a nice, less violent side of you. Which makes me feel safer, so I'm not about to let you let that go," Danny explained as he physically shoved his partner out of the office. "Now go."

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"_You've reached Catherine Rollins; leave a message."_

"Hey, Cath, I know that we started off the morning kind of weird but I'd really like to see you before you get back on the Enterprise. Call me."

McGarrett sat uselessly in the driver's seat of his truck. He was still at Five-0 headquarters, having had nowhere to go since Cath wouldn't answer her phone. It had been almost an hour since his first call to her and since Danny had kicked him out of his own office.

Steve finally resolved to leave her one more message, to say goodbye if nothing else. Who knows how long it would be before he got to see her again.

"_You've reached Catherine Rollins; leave a message."_

"Okay, Catherine, I'm not sure when you're getting back on the boat, so I guess this is goodbye. Thanks for spending the weekend with me; it was really nice."

Steve was racking his brain, trying to figure out something significant to say to her that wouldn't push her even further away. But he could think of nothing.

"Just give me a call so I know you got safely back on the Enterprise, okay? Even if you don't want to talk. You know how things are. Okay. I'll see you."

McGarrett absolutely hated this. He was supposed to be a ladies' man, always out with exotic women and never sleeping alone. This was pointless, this was ridiculous, to be sitting by himself in a parking lot for hours on end calling the same person ten times who was obviously not taking his calls. Agitated, he got out of his truck and slammed the door.

And blissfully, his phone rang.

"Cath, hey," he greeted, trying to keep his cool. He could guess she was just calling to tell him she was back on the boat, like he had asked.

"Steve..." Catherine answered, her voice strained with tears.

McGarrett's heart jumped into his throat at the sound of her voice and the choked off sob that followed. Catherine did not cry.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Author's Note: **Hey guys! I was incredibly flattered by the responses I got to this. Thank you! And let's just say I was inspired, so here's the second chapter hot on the heels of the last one. I try to keep my author's notes to a minimum, but I just wanted to say thanks, and to keep those reviews and alerts coming! -Shash_

* * *

Catherine had watched her phone vibrate on the coffee table in front of her four times.

She sat in her small and barely-lived-in apartment, dressed in her Navy working uniform, waiting for the next two hours to slip by until it would be acceptable for her to show up at the Enterprise and embark.

Catherine had attempted to push the things Steve had said this morning out of her head, but his persistent calls had not allowed her to do so. When she didn't pick up time and time again, she preferred not to think that she was avoiding him, but rather waiting until she had something to say.

But the truth was, she didn't want to face his scrutiny—she didn't want him looking at her like that again. She didn't want to feel his eyes boring into her as she tried to hide the scars she had (as of yet) kept so well hidden.

Steve had accepted her as she was six years ago. She was looking for fun and he was looking to get laid…so it had been the perfect arrangement. He didn't ask her questions about her past and she did the same. That first night in Coronado they had laughed and kissed their whole way through the night under the guise of being completely wasted and not knowing any better than to do this with a fellow sailor. But they did know better, and neither of them was that drunk. They had seen each other before, watched each other, and had liked what they had seen.

And apparently, Steve hadn't seen anything quite as good since.

The guilt was overwhelming, and Catherine, for the first time in her life, wished that she could cry. The whole thing frustrated her, but more than anything it just made her feel so _shallow_ to know that what she thought was simple really wasn't that simple at all.

Catherine forced herself to think on the bright side. _Hey,_ _at least he doesn't love you._

_Oh God._

_What if he loves you?_

_Shit._

But Catherine, in a very typically female and self-deprecating way, told herself that _no, of course he doesn't love you. Who could, right? I mean, you're YOU, for god's sake._

And then she found her mind wandering, thinking, fantasizing—what would it be like, to be loved? How would that change her? What would be different? What would it be like, knowing that there was someone who was always going to be there for her? She'd never really had that.

And although she couldn't quite bring herself to _want_ it, she _saw _it…for the first time in nearly a decade. She saw that it could happen. That she might be okay with that. Sometime. Maybe.

A knock on her front door pulled her out of her uncharacteristic thoughts. For a moment she was filled with a sudden and intense dread, thinking that it might be McGarrett. But he had his classic knock, and that was not it. Suppressing her anxiety, Catherine opened the door as her phone vibrated again on the table in the middle of the room.

The middle-aged man on the other side of the door looked kind enough.

"Good afternoon, ma'am," he greeted her politely, his hands formally clasped behind his back.

"Hello," Cath said, suddenly wary of being sold something.

"My name is Jason Marin, and I'm with the Society of—"

Catherine cut him off with what she hoped was a polite hand and a smile. "I'm sorry. You've caught me at a really bad time. I was just leaving."

The man's smile dropped right off his face. "You don't have a moment for underprivileged children?"

Obviously, today was destined to be a day filled with guilt. "Not right now, I'm sorry," she replied sincerely, motioning to her uniform. "Duty calls. Literally."

"Of course, Miss…" he read the strip of fabric right above her pocket. "Miss Rollins. And thank you for your service."

The two of them stood there awkwardly for a moment as she waited for him to turn and go.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Kono entered Danny's office with a confused look on her face.

"So…_where's_ McGarrett?" she asked, holding up her phone, where Danny's email was pulled up.

Danny leaned back in his chair, obviously proud of himself. "If I told you that, I'd have to kill you."

"Well we wouldn't want that…" Kono said with a nod. "So I guess…I'll just go do paperwork?"

"That's a great idea. I deem this official Paperwork Day," Danny said, dramatically holding his arms out. Kono just kind of looked at him.

"Ok then. Paperwork it is," she said with a smile as she backed out of the office.

Chin Ho was just coming in to HQ as she did so. "So…_where's _McGarrett?" he asked his cousin in the exact same tone.

Kono shrugged. "Danny wouldn't say. But he _did_ deem it official Paperwork Day."

Chin let out a low whistle. "Oh, that's really too bad," he said sarcastically. "Because,_ I_ have all this top-secret stuff _I_ need to do, too. Totally forgot about it until just now…."

Kono punched him in the arm. "Yeah, you wish. What you are going to do, though, is help me write up this month's reports," she told him as she slipped into her office.

Following her, Chin Ho shrugged. "So we'll be out of here by noon, right?"

Kono shook her head, dropping a sizable stack on files on her desk. "This is the first half."

Chin just shook his head a laughed a little. "I suppose this is what we signed up for when we agreed to work under McGarrett…who is _where_ again?"

"Top-secret mission."

"That's interesting. Because his truck is still here, and I'm pretty sure I saw him sitting in it."

"How did he look?" Kono asked, taking the top file off the stack.

"Bored."

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

After a few uncomfortable moments of the man practically leering at her, he took his leave. "Alright, well, I'll let you get about your business, Miss Rollins."

"Sorry you caught me at a bad time," she said as a sort of non-answer.

She shut the door as her phone buzzed a sixth time. This time she walked straight to it, ready to pick it up and ask Steve to please leave her alone for the time being. That she just needed some time. She just needed to think.

The picture of him on the screen of her phone mocked her.

_They had just downed a few beers when she remembered that she needed a picture of him in her new phone. Excitedly, she had pulled it out, and he had tried to draw her in close so they could both be in the picture._

"_No, just you," she had insisted._

"_Oh, come on, Cath."_

"_It's only your name that's gonna come up, so it should only be your face."_

"_It's no good with just me," he'd argued._

"_It's perfect. Just like that. Smile," she'd ordered._

Cath tossed the phone back on the table. Early or not, she had to get out of the house. Wallowing in fantasies that could never be and memories that taunted her was not helping.

As she slowly made her way to the bedroom to grab her duffle bag, she heard another knock on the front door. Catherine still took her time, hoping whoever it was would just go away. But they knocked twice more as she gathered her things, so she answered the door again. At least this time it actually _looked_ like she was leaving.

It was the same man, and he was once again smiling politely at her. Catherine nearly laughed and told him _See? I really am leaving…_

But then something changed.

It was odd, how things seemed to move in both fast-forward and slow-motion simultaneously. Because Catherine didn't even have time to think to shut the door on him before she had done so. It was only after she had that she realized he wasn't here to sell her something. He was here for her. She turned to lock the door but his arm was holding it open and he was pushing with all of his might to open the door the rest of the way.

Her phone buzzed again, a world away.

Catherine released the door only the slightest bit so that she could shove all her weight against it again to snap his arm in the frame. It worked, though she wasn't sure she'd broken it like she'd hoped. But he was hurt enough to pull back and she had time to lock the door three times over.

Adrenaline rushing through her system, Catherine ran to the back room to grab the gun she had never thought she would need. Oddly, she had time to think about the night when McGarrett had given it to her.

"_In case you ever get into trouble when I'm half a world away," he had told her with a sad smile just before a mission had taken him somewhere he couldn't tell her. And then he'd kissed her—really kissed her._

Shit. He loved her.

As she shakily tried to load the gun she hadn't touched in a solid two years, the blasted thing jammed on her. She was no gun expert, and knew that if she tried to fix it she was likely to shoot herself in the face. She put it back in the drawer and slammed it shut just as she heard breaking glass from the front room.

She needed her phone. She needed McGarrett.

Even though she was running straight towards her would-be attacker, Catherine made a break for it. In an intense moment of sheer courage, Catherine didn't even notice that she was crying.

She grabbed her phone, though it was so near the window the man was crawling through, and ran to the front door. Luckily she was fast, and was out the door and had it slammed behind her when he was still halfway through the window.

Catherine dialed Steve's number as she ran away from her own home. She didn't yet have an idea of where she was running _to,_ she just knew that she had to get away.

Steve answered on the first ring. "Cath, hey," he answered nonchalantly.

"Steve…" Cath managed through her labored breathing and the tears she hadn't noticed until now.

McGarrett was suddenly and dangerously serious. "Cath, what happened?" he demanded.

She was still running at break-neck speed and struggled for breath with which to answer. "Someone came to my house. I don't know what they wanted. But this man…he came after me."

Steve, half an island away, reeled at the new direction this day was about to take. "_He came after you?"_ he repeated, furious. "Are you alright? Where are you now?"

She didn't answer him right away, but he tried to be patient. He could tell she was running. "I'm okay. I think I broke his arm."

"That's my girl," he nodded to himself. "Where are you? I'm going to come get you. But I want you to get inside, find someone. A neighbor, someone. Anyone. Okay?" He was taking the steps up to Five-0 headquarters in threes. He needed Danny. He needed his team.

Just as he had his hand on the door to HQ, Cath answered him. "I'm close to base. I can make it."

"Catherine…" he nearly begged her.

"You've never beaten me," she reminded him, and hung up.

Of course, Steve knew what she meant—they'd raced many times: on foot, swimming, quads… competition fueled their relationship, and after being put to the test time and time again, they both knew that while Steve was the strong one, Catherine was the fast one. Steve knew that.

But he didn't like her out there by herself, he didn't like her on foot, and he certainly didn't like that she'd barely given him any information to work with in regards to whoever it was who had "come after her", and what the hell that was even supposed to mean.

Curse her and her fierce independence.

Steve ripped the glass door open.

"Danny!" he yelled without pausing to breathe. "Danny, get in your car. Get Chin and Kono and _get in your car_."

And before any of them had a chance to ask a single question, Steve was taking the stairs down in threes again.

His phone rang as he jogged to his truck. Danny had him on speakerphone as they all followed him out of HQ. "Steve, what is going on?" Danny asked seriously.

Steve was already peeling out of the parking lot. "I need you guys to go to Catherine's apartment. It's 675 Roosevelt Drive, near Pearl. Someone came after her and I need you to see what happened there."

"Where are _you_ going?" Kono asked as they all strapped themselves into Danny's Camaro.

"She's on foot and headed towards the base. I'm going to go get her," Steve nearly growled.

"Steve, what the hell is going on?" Danny asked as he broke so many traffic laws he felt like McGarrett.

There was a moment of silence. "I don't know," Steve finally answered, and hung up. He needed to call Catherine again.

It rang twice before she answered. She still sounded winded. "I can make it," she said by way of greeting.

"I'm going to be there in three minutes," he promised her. "I'll meet you at the gate, okay?"

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

_They were about to come into port, and the whole ship buzzed with a subdued kind of excitement as they all anticipated the liberty call._

_Catherine remained at her station, but there was suddenly a familiar voice behind her. "You got any plans this weekend?" he asked her quietly._

_She didn't turn around to answer him. "I suppose that depends on your planning, Lieutenant," she answered coyly. _

_Steve leaned forward to speak in her ear. "I made reservations. Somewhere nice."_

_Catherine turned around and met his eyes. Those stupidly beautiful eyes. "Then I'll meet you at the gate," she promised him._

_Pleased, Steve turned and left, confident that she would keep her word. She always had._


	3. Chapter 3

As Steve pulled up to the main gate at Pearl, it was like he was being suffocated when he didn't see her. With how fast she could run and how far her apartment was, she should have beaten him. She should have been there already.

The guard came around to ask for a badge, but there was no need. Steve had already jumped out of his truck and met the guard halfway. "Lieutenant Rollins, is she here?" he barked.

The guard knew Lt. Rollins, and didn't have to check the logs. "No, she hasn't been through since she left yesterday."

Steve turned on his heel, looking to the direction she should be coming from. He nearly turned to get back in his truck and drive her route backwards and find her. But then she rounded the corner at the end of the street.

Catherine did not slow down when she saw Steve waiting at the gate for her. It actually gave her a second wind. To reach safety. To reach him. It was only a few hundred yards.

Relieved beyond belief, Steve covered his face with his hands, taking a moment to calm down. She was here. She was safe.

And after that moment, he jogged to close the distance between them even faster.

A smile broke out on Cath's face when she saw him coming towards her. She'd never thought, before today, that she would see Steve running towards her. And this time she wasn't running away.

In that moment, before they had even reached each other, Catherine decided something with finality. She wasn't running away. Not now, not anymore.

When the gap between them was closed nearly enough, Cath practically flew into McGarrett's arms. By necessity, they had never been keen on public displays of affection, and that was something hard-wired into both of them. So, as two friends reunited, a fierce hug would have to suffice.

"You made it," Steve sighed as he embraced her.

"You beat me," she laughed in a joking disbelief.

"I was in a hurry," he answered, squeezing her tighter. "I'm so glad you're okay."

Steve did not want to let her go. In his life, so many precious things had been taken from him, or had been threatened. His mother, his father, his sister, Danny, Chin Ho, Kono, Joe… and many of his closest SEAL buddies.

Catherine's safety had always been a worry lurking in the back of his mind, asking to be addressed. He'd always optimistically thought that they didn't spend enough time together for her to be put in harm's way because of him. And besides, she had the whole power of the US Navy behind her, right?

And it was true that he couldn't know who was behind what happened today. He didn't know who was at fault and he didn't know how Catherine had been caught in the middle of it all. But those were questions for another time. For now, Steve just had to be assured that she was safe, that she _felt_ safe, and that she was unharmed.

But the events of the morning before the day had taken a wild turn still grated on his mind. As he released her from the hug and led her to his truck with his hand at the small of her back, he couldn't help but wonder if anything was different in her eyes.

As they climbed into his Chevy, Steve gathered the courage to ask about it, but swallowed the question when he saw the distress on Catherine's face.

"Are you sure you're okay?" he asked, starting the car.

She nodded silently.

Catching on to the new mood she was clearly in, Steve drove in silence.

Once she had climbed into his truck, Catherine had a minute to process what had just happened. What _could_ have happened. And now she had to think long and hard about _why._

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Danny pulled up to the apartment that looked undisturbed and dialed Steve again.

"Hey, partner, I'm at the address you gave me. Remind me what I'm looking for," Danny said as he got out of the car. "Oh wait, that's right, you never told me in the first place."

"Cath said that she probably broke his arm in the door frame. Check for prints there," Steve answered on the other side of the line. There was a muffled sound as, Danny assumed, Catherine mentioned something. And then Steve spoke again. "She says he tried to come in through the window around back. Be advised that he or his associates may still be inside."

"Oh, that's just perfect," Danny mumbled as he hung up, looking to the rest of the team. "You guys hear that?" Chin and Kono nodded, weapons at the ready as they approached the house.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"Shouldn't we be headed back to my apartment? To help your team?" Cath asked as she noticed the route they were taking.

Steve shook his head. "No way. I don't want you anywhere near there."

"So where are we going?"

"You should be safe back at Five-0 headquarters."

"Why didn't you just let me get on the Enterprise? There's no safer place," she reasoned.

For some reason, her question put him suddenly on edge. "Look, I'm sorry if this doesn't make sense to you, but we need you _here _while we figure this out. Not in the middle of the Pacific Ocean."

"So you need me here, but not back at my apartment where I could actually be of help?"

"I need to keep you safe, Cath, and that doesn't include dragging you back to the place where you were just attacked." Steve was trying to figure out why he even had to tell her this.

"So you're just going to hide me away?"

"Yes. For now. Until we figure this out."

"You're right. That doesn't make sense to me," Catherine said. She looked out her window, her body language clear that this conversation was over.

The silence was long, it was uncomfortable, and it was tense enough to cut with a knife.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

After the house was cleared, Kono and Danny relaxed, looking around themselves, still wondering what it was they were looking for.

Chin Ho was inspecting the broken window. "I got blood," he called over his shoulder. "The assailant must've cut himself trying to crawl through."

Danny nodded. "Perfect," he said, as if they'd just closed the case. "Get a sample of that bitch and then I can go beat some answers out of McGarrett." He headed for the door.

"Wait, Danny," Kono stopped him. "We're not going to process the whole place?"

"Oh, rookie," Danny laughed affectionately at her. "Sometimes the cases really are cut-and-dry, despite what working with Steve may have suggested to you."

Kono shook her head at him. "First of all—" she pointed to herself, "not a rookie. Second, what if he took something? Maybe we should bring Catherine back here just to make sure that everything seems in order."

Danny turned himself in a small, sarcastic circle. "The TV's here. Her duffle bag's here, which I'm assuming has at least a laptop in it. Nothing's been ransacked or looked through."

"Then what was this all about? If Catherine didn't know the guy? What was the point?"

"Maybe she did know him," Chin Ho tossed out as a theory.

Danny shook his head. "No, Catherine said she'd never seen the guy before."

"Maybe she was lying?" Chin guessed again.

"Theoretically it's possible, but that would be very bad news," Danny said with a sigh. When the other two looked at him with confused looks, Danny gave in and explained. "The top secret thing Steve was taking care of this morning was Catherine. They've come to a…crossroads, if you will."

"That's as good a time as any to lie about guys you do and don't know, if you ask me…" Kono offered.

"Great. This is bad. I'm going to have to deal with Steve when he gets all…righteous and defensive," Danny moaned.

Chin shrugged. "You don't think he'll believe you?"

"No. I don't. Catherine is the one living person besides his _sister_ who has known him the longest. He trusts her—probably more than he trusts me, so no, Chin, I don't think he'll believe me when I tell him she might be lying to him." Danny turned and stalked out of the apartment.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Steve had expected Catherine to follow him when he got out of the truck, but she had stayed seated. He waited for a moment, then came around to the other side to open her door.

She made no move, not even to unbuckle her seatbelt. She stared straight ahead.

"Catherine?" he asked, trying to pull her out of what seemed like a very deep set of thoughts.

"I've been through a lot of shit," she began, her eyes glued to the windshield. "But somehow I've always felt that I deserved it. I always knew there was a reason. But I don't understand this. I don't know why that man came after me. I don't know what he wanted and I don't know what's going to happen now that he didn't get it. Or maybe he did get it, and this is over. Maybe it wasn't about _me_ at all. I just don't know. I don't know anything, and it's pissing me off."

Steve wanted to embrace her, but it was clear from their conversation earlier and the expression on her face now that that was the absolute last thing that she wanted. He leaned against the open door. "Come inside, Cath."

Finally she looked at him. "I'm sorry about this morning."

"It's okay," Steve answered sincerely. "We can talk about it another time."

"I want to talk about it now," she decided.

"In the parking lot?" he asked incredulously.

"Yes." Catherine unbuckled her seat belt and turned towards the open door to face him. With the height of the truck, she was above him, and she liked it. Steve looked up at her expectantly. She took a deep breath to steady herself. "I haven't seen anyone besides you in the last six years."

Steve couldn't help but smile. "That's good, isn't it?"

Cath sighed, frustrated. "I don't know, maybe. Look, I wasn't waiting around for your calls. I had this life, and it included you sometimes, but it wasn't _about_ you. When I wasn't with you, I didn't really think about you. I didn't care if—"

The driver's side window of the truck shattered, and Catherine felt the pain before she heard the shot ring out in the courtyard. At first the world went white as the searing hot bullet tore through her chest, but then she could see again, with a sort of intense clarity.

Steve, at first, reacted with the same pain that she felt. But then he met her eyes, looked her over, and wrenched her out of her seat above him, tearing her out of the car and hiding her between the seat and the open door, covering her back with his own body.

The others in the parking lot screamed and ran for cover. Steve looked frantically for the source of the bullet as he held Catherine in the safety of his arms.

But there had only been one shot, and the job was done.


	4. Chapter 4

For the first few moments, Steve could not look at her face.

He had to concentrate.

Briefly looking around himself, he found nothing with which to put pressure on her wound. Impatient, he tore the shirt off his own back and pressed it firmly to the upper right section of Catherine's torso. From what he could tell, they'd missed her lungs, they'd missed her heart, and they'd missed the most important arteries. Whoever _they_ were.

But she was still bleeding. A lot. And she wasn't really moving. The shot was through-and-through, so he did his best to stop the bleeding from both sides.

"Catherine…" Steve began firmly as he leaned over her face, finally taking a moment to look at it. He was shocked to see her eyes were already closed. "Catherine, can you hear me?" he asked loudly.

He grabbed her face when she didn't answer, a little less gently than he otherwise might have. "Goddamn it, Cath, answer me!"

It had only been a few moments since the shot had rung out, but Steve already heard sirens in the distance. _Good, that was one less thing to worry about._ Although he did wonder who had called 9-1-1 and didn't have the decency to come and see if they could help the woman who had clearly been shot.

As Steve continued to hold pressure to the gunshot wound that he could only pray was not threatening her life, he continued to speak to her.

"Catherine, listen to me," he began again. This time he saw her eyes move beneath her eyelids and knew she could hear him this time. "You're going to be okay. The paramedics are on their way, and you'll be fine, alright?" He was trying his hardest to ignore his blood-soaked shirt and bloodstained hands as he spoke. "Cath, come on, answer me," he nearly pleaded.

Catherine barely coughed, but it was enough. She opened her eyes and looked directly at him.

"Hey, Sailor," he greeted her gently.

Her expression went from confused to wincing at the immense amount of pain in under a second. "Ow," she said almost blandly.

Steve let out a short, sad laugh. "I know, getting shot is the worst, isn't it?"

"Why did I get shot?" Cath asked, seemingly trying to keep her mind off the pain and prove to Steve that she was tough. "What did I do?"

Steve's hand was stroking her hair as he tried to soothe her assumptions. "You didn't do anything. I don't know what's going on but I promise you that I'm going to figure it out, okay?"

Cath nodded weakly. "Okay."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Danny had heard the sirens in the distance as he pulled into the parking lot at headquarters, but he never would have guessed what they were for.

His partner kneeled shirtless next to his truck, and Danny almost scoffed at Steve for using any and every excuse to get undressed. But then he saw the unmistakable pattern of the Navy working uniform lying on the ground in front of him.

Danny broke out into a run. "Steve!" he called.

McGarrett did not turn, his attention completely focused on holding pressure to Catherine's wound and trying to keep her there with him. He had tied his shirt around her shoulder as best he could but it didn't seem that it was doing any good. She was still bleeding too much.

"Steve, what happened?" Danny demanded as he knelt next to him, trying to figure out how he could help.

"What does it look like happened, huh Danny?" Steve yelled. "Catherine's been shot. There was only one shot. Maybe a minute ago, maybe less. It came from that way," he nodded with his head, his bloody hands busy applying that pressure. "Probably a sniper. Go!"

Danny did not need any more direction than that. Chin followed him.

Kono took Danny's place kneeling next to McGarrett. Catherine's eyes were glazed over in pain but she was breathing steadily and responding as Steve continued to talk to her. Taking a look around her, Kono noticed something that seemed to have gone unnoticed by everyone—including McGarrett.

"Boss, your arm. You're bleeding," Kono said in a soft tone that did not betray her surprise.

"I don't care."

Kono looked again, trying to see where Catherine's blood on his hands ended and where his own wound began.

"Where's the goddamn ambulance?" Steve was muttering under his breath, placing his leg under Catherine's head as a pillow. There really wasn't much else he could do.

"Here, let me look at your arm—" Kono tried to reach for his injured forearm but Steve wrenched his arm out of her grasp.

"Stop, Kono," he bit sharply.

Kono pulled back instinctively, but just before she made herself insist, the paramedics pulled into the parking lot. Within the minute, they had Catherine loaded up on a stretcher as Steve held onto her hand and explained to them what had happened. As they lifted her in to the back of the ambulance, Steve hesitated, trying to decide whether or not he should go with them. Danny might be back with news.

A second ambulance pulled in to the parking lot, and Kono made the decision for him. "Boss, you stay here and get your arm looked at. When Danny and Chin come back, you'll be in the loop and you guys can figure out what's going on. I'll go with Catherine," she offered.

Steve, obviously reeling with the decisions he was having to make, just nodded. "Yeah, okay, that's good. Go."

Kono hopped in the back of the first ambulance just as the second one pulled up. Steve, only now noticing what Kono had pointed out, sat on the frame of the open door of his truck and inspected his own wound. From what he could tell, the bullet was lodged in his forearm. It had gone straight through Catherine's chest and into his arm, where the bone had probably stopped it.

Wary of Catherine's blood on his hands, he did not touch the wound, but only looked at it.

A paramedic from the second ambulance had jumped out of the passenger's seat and approached the Navy SEAL. "Sir, were you hit?"

Steve extended his wounded arm to the paramedic. "Yup," he said simply, his mind obviously elsewhere.

After looking at and prodding at the wound for a few seconds, the paramedic sighed. "I can't get the bullet out here, sir. You're going to have to come in to the hospital."

"I _really_ don't want to do that," Steve replied simply. "Don't worry about hurting me, I'll be fine. But the bullet is evidence. I need it."

"Sir, you really need to go to the hospital. It looks like the bullet is lodged in the bone," the paramedic argued.

"I'm in the middle of a case right now, you understand?" Steve attempted to reason with the medic. "I need to be here for my team."

As if on cue, Danny and Chin Ho rounded the corner of the building and saw McGarrett arguing with the medic. As they approached, Danny now noticed Steve's wound.

"Steven, what the hell are you doing? Get in the ambulance," he ordered as he walked in on the argument. "You told me there was only one shot. Are you lying to me now? Is that a thing we're going to start doing? Because I don't like it."

"I wasn't lying, it's the same bullet," Steve answered offhandedly. "Did you find anything?"

"We've got HPD scouting all the possible rooftops. But the guy is long gone. Look, I know you want to find out who did this, and you're a Navy SEAL and you're invincible, but would you get your stubborn ass into the ambulance now? Please? For me?" Danny asked impatiently.

Steve gave him a look, but stood up. "For you, Danno."

Danny clasped his hands together. "Thank you."

"Call me if you find anything," Steve ordered.

"Not until you get the bullet out of your arm," Danny refused.

"Let us know how Catherine's doing," Chin Ho chimed in, setting the conversation back on course.

Steve finally looked back to the paramedic who had merely stood there in silence, waiting for permission to begin dressing McGarrett's wound. "Alright, man. Patch me up and take me in. For Danno's sake."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"You said this bullet passed through another person before it hit you?" the young doctor in front of Steve asked in disbelief as he carefully cleaned the wound.

"I didn't even notice it until someone else pointed it out."

"You're tough, man," the doctor remarked, definitely impressed. "How many times have you been shot?" he asked, wide-eyed.

"More than most people," Steve admitted. "But less than I deserve, probably, considering the kind of trouble I usually find myself in."

The doctor nodded, concentrating on removing the bullet.

"Oh, god, that hurts like hell," Steve muttered under his breath as the doctor made his first move to remove the hunk of metal from his arm.

"Not so tough now, huh Commander?" the doctor laughed as he made another move. Then, in an attempt to distract him, the doctor continued. "So the other gunshot victim, did you know them?"

Looking past the pain, Steve took a second to answer. "Yes. Very well. She is my oldest friend."

The doctor looked up, a bit confused at his use of the present tense. "She lived? After a through-and-through with _this_ bullet?"

Steve was suddenly worried. "She was alive when they loaded her into the ambulance. She should have arrived just before me."

The doctor didn't answer, but finally pulled the bullet out of Steve's arm.

Steve groaned in pain, but made sure to tell the doctor what he needed again. "I need the bullet. It's evidence."

His phone rang then, but he didn't recognize the number. "McGarrett," he answered briefly.

"Boss, it's me," Kono answered from the other end of the line.

"Kono, hey, tell me you have good news."

The doctor went about re-dressing his wound as Kono slowly explained.

"It wasn't a real medic team, Steve. The ambulance, it was a fake. They threw me out on the south side of the island. I didn't see where they went. But they took her, boss."

Steve could not find the words to reply. He couldn't move, couldn't think. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't _fucking_ breathe.


	5. Chapter 5

Danny found his partner sitting with his face in his hands in an empty hallway of the hospital. He sat down wordlessly next to him, but Steve did not acknowledge his presence for a solid two minutes.

"This morning," Steve began, his head still in his hands and his voice hoarse, "everything was fine. Is it some kind of sign, Danny? That I can't have people like Catherine in my life? Because before I said anything to her, she was fine. She was happy and healthy and safe." Steve looked up now, his gaze focusing on the wall across the way. "But the day I try to tell her how I feel…not only does she turn away from me," he shook his head in disbelief, "but she gets _attacked_, then she gets _shot_, then she gets _kidnapped_. Tell me that's a coincidence, Danno."

"You blaming yourself for all of this?" Danny asked.

Steve just nodded. "How can I not?"

"Well, I'll tell you what: it can't be because of you, alright? Because the only person who knew that anything had changed was me. And I sure as hell didn't tell anyone." Danny leaned forward, ready to pose Chin's hypothesis. "It's possible that this really is all about Catherine, you know."

Steve didn't answer.

"She could have known her attacker. She could know all of these people. Maybe from some trouble in the past?"

"She said she didn't know the guy," Steve argued.

Danny hesitated. "She could have lied, you know," he breeched gently.

Steve slowly turned his gaze towards his partner. "What did you just say?"

Danny's hands were up in defense. "I'm just asking the questions."

Agitated, Steve stood. "No, Cath and I don't lie to each other. We don't work that way."

"Are you sure you guys were on the same page about that? Because from what you told me this morning, you and Catherine had very differing opinions as to how your relationship worked."

"Chin's probably back at HQ with Kono," Steve changed the subject. "I want to find out exactly what happened." He turned on his heel and headed to the Camaro without a second glance back at his partner.

_The op had gone south. I mean really, really south. Like, to-the-depths-of-hell south. _

_Naturally, it was all classified, so he couldn't speak a word to anyone about the most horrible night of his existence. Which only made it worse. And as if the universe was just trying to see how far it could push him before he broke, his cell phone lit up with Catherine's smile. Of course the one person he truly wanted to talk to would call him on the night he couldn't say a word. Because it was one of those days._

_One of his fellow SEAL team members saw her picture out of the corner of his eye as they changed next to each other in the tent. All of their minds were clouded with thoughts of what had just happened, but Brian was always the first to look through the fog and see the bright side of life._

"_Aren't you going to answer that?" Brian asked after McGarrett had set the phone back down, face-up so they could still see the picture._

"_Nah," Steve tried to shrug it off._

"_You might not be able to talk about what just happened, man," Brian began to reason with him, "but I have found that you start seeing the point of everything a lot faster with a little help from your friends."_

"_Are you suggesting that I smoke some reefer, Brian? Because I'm pretty sure that's frowned upon," Steve joked._

_Brian reached over and grabbed Steve's phone, and hit the redial button. "I'm suggesting that you spend some time with Catherine. She brings out a nice side of you," he told him, holding out the phone to him. "Even if you can't tell her everything."_

_McGarrett took the phone and quickly stepped out, walking through the pitch black night to the most secluded area he could find._

"_Hey, Sailor," Cath greeted from the other end. "Hope I didn't wake you."_

_Steve tried to laugh, tried to sound okay. "Nah, I'm awake."_

"_Well that's good. Listen, I was just calling to let you know I'm in San Diego for a few days, and I was wondering if you were too," she said easily._

"_Yeah, I should be back about 3 tomorrow afternoon," he answered._

"_Oh, good," Catherine laughed. "Because you owe me dinner."_

_That made Steve smile. "You always say that, and I keep trying to take you out…"_

"…_but I like to stay in, I know," she finished for him. "So it's a date?"_

"_Absolutely." Something about the normalcy of going on a date with Cath made it exactly what he needed. But how simple it all seemed—in comparison to what he had just witnessed—it was almost artificial._

"_Hey Cath?" he asked as they were about to say their goodbyes._

"_Yeah."_

"_Do you have a minute to talk?"_

_She laughed lightly. "Do _you_ have a minute to talk?" she parroted back at him. "Because if my memory serves me right, you're on assignment right now and I don't even know how I got you on the phone."_

_Steve laughed quietly, careful not to be heard by the others. "What can I say, I'm a rebel."_

_Catherine heard his joke, but she must have heard the pain hiding just behind it as well. "Are you okay, Sailor?"_

_Steve sighed. "No," he answered truthfully. "It was bad, Cath. Really bad."_

_Catherine waited for a moment to just let it sink in for both of them, understanding and adapting to where this conversation was going. "Did you lose anyone?" She knew his answer couldn't be specific, but she wanted a gauge on _how_ bad._

"_Yeah." His answer was strangled in his throat as he tried to keep his emotions in check. "Two."_

"_Steve, I'm so sorry."_

"_Thanks." He was distracted as he thought he heard footsteps behind him. "Hey, really. Thank you, Catherine," he said again more sincerely. "I have to go, I'll call you tomorrow."_

"_Okay," Catherine answered easily. "I'll talk to you tomorrow. And Steve?"_

"_Yeah."_

"_You're going to be okay," she reminded him, and directly hung up. And that's what he told himself every moment until the next day when she could tell him again herself. Because that was exactly what he needed to hear, and that was exactly why he needed her._

Of course Steve had played with the idea in his mind that Catherine had lied to him. He had nearly hoped that this was all about her, and that it could easily be fixed. But when he was honest with himself, he knew that Catherine was not capable of lying to him, just as he was not capable of lying to her. They had shared too much. Which is why, despite what his team was telling him, Steve refused to believe that Catherine had done something to deserve this.

Unable to drive due to the pain in his arm, Steve leaned on the passenger's side door and waited for Danny to catch up. Once he did, they wordlessly got in. The air was tense.

"Danno, can I explain something to you?" Steve said after a moment.

"Of course you can."

"I don't think I'm in love with Catherine."

"How can you _think_ you're not in love?" Danny asked critically. "You either love someone or you don't."

"Do you love Rachel?" Steve challenged, knowing the answer.

"…that's different."

"No, it's complicated, right?" Steve asked. "Well, Catherine and I are complicated too."

"Have you ever even been in love, Steven? Because honestly, you don't seem like the type of person who has time for feelings. You seem like you much prefer armed conflict," Danny joked. But his question was a legitimate one.

"I would say that Cath is probably the closest I've ever come," Steve admitted. "You?"

"I am a very passionate person," Danny said by way of answer.

"You're a little man slut, aren't you?" Steve was able to laugh in the midst of such turmoil.

Danny shrugged. "First of all, I take offense to the use of the word 'little'. And second, yes. I have said 'I love you' to so many different women that I honestly could not give you a number."

"Did you actually love them all?"

He thought for a moment. "Each in their own way. Some more than others."

"Like Rachel?"

"Yes. Like Rachel."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Kono waited in the common area of headquarters, bracing herself on the edges of the table.

Of all the bad news she had ever had to break to McGarrett, she was sure nothing had and nothing ever would top this.

As she saw her boss making his way to the glass door with Danny hot on his heels, Kono took a deep and steadying breath. She would not be reduced to a sniveling mess. Not today.

Just before they opened the door, Danny turned to Steve, holding him back by the shoulder and whispering in his ear. Steve rolled his eyes and pushed the door open.

He walked the entire distance to the main computer without a word, his face absolutely unreadable. It was unnerving for Kono, because she just wanted to get this over with. She had lost McGarrett's girl, and now it was time to face his wrath.

"Are you alright, Kono?" Steve asked sincerely.

Kono blinked, and answered only after a moment of surprise. Wasn't he angry? "Um, yeah. Just a little banged up." She motioned to her bandaged elbow. "I wasn't kidding when I said they _threw_ me out of the ambulance. While it was moving."

Steve nodded. "Well, I'm glad you're okay."

Kono couldn't stand this. "Look, Steve. I'm really sorry. I tried to fight them. But they totally caught me off guard. And there were two of them. I just…I didn't have time to make a plan and now they've got Catherine and I have no idea—" Kono cut herself off. Damn it, she had promised herself she wouldn't cry.

As she began to gather up her strength again to explain further, Steve's phone interrupted them all. Steve looked at her apologetically before taking his phone from his pocket.

The look of slight annoyance turned to alarm in a split second. "It's Catherine's number," he told the rest.

"Answer it," Danny ordered.

Chin began to run a trace on the call the second McGarrett accepted it. He put it on speakerphone. "McGarrett," he answered cautiously.

"Hey, baby," Catherine answered roughly from the other end of the line.

"Cath! Are you alright?"

"I'll live. Listen, they wanted me to give you a message." Steve could tell that she was still in massive amounts of pain, but she attempted to keep her voice strong. "They want you, alone, in an hour. They said at the docks, that you'd know which ones."

Steve's head was in his hands again as he braced himself on the table over his phone. This was not going to end well. For anyone. "Can you tell me anything else, Cath? Anything?"

"Just that I love you, Steven. Tell Maggie I'm sorry."

"I will," he told her with conviction. "I promise."

And the call was over as suddenly as it had come.

There was a long, pregnant pause among the team. Steve would not look at any of them. Because this was all his fault, and now he had proof.

"So what's the plan?" Chin finally asked. "Did the trace work?"

Kono closed the program. "No, it didn't."

Danny turned to Steve. "Well, you're not going, that's for sure."

McGarrett looked up and began typing rapidly into the computer. "I may not have to."

The rest of the team waited for him to explain. He didn't.

"Care to explain, boss?" Kono finally asked as McGarrett threw what he had typed out onto the big screen.

_Just that I love you, Steven. Tell Maggie I'm sorry._

"What does this look like to you?" Steve asked.

Danny shifted uncomfortably. "Like the words of someone who thinks she's not going to live through this.

Steve nodded. "Right. Which is what she wants everyone to think. But not me."

The blank stares he received prompted him to elaborate. "Cath and I were in Naval Intelligence together. She does cryptography for a living. It's code."

Danny tried to put a hand on Steve's shoulder. "Steve, come on."

McGarrett shrugged Danny's hand off. "It's _code_," he insisted. "It has to be."


	6. Chapter 6

Chin Ho Kelley had learned a long time ago to trust the McGarretts. So even though Danny insisted that Steve was imagining things, Chin raised his hands to quiet him and looked to McGarrett.

"What makes you think that it's code, Steve?" Chin asked calmly.

McGarrett nodded almost imperceptibly, as if thanking the Lieutenant for going out on a limb with him. "Okay, I was tipped of by how she answered the phone. She called me baby."

Danny rolled his eyes, but Steve explained. "In the seven years I've known her, she's never called me that. She calls me lots of things, but not baby."

"You do remember that she just got _shot_, right?" Danny criticized.

Steve just spoke over him. "The second thing was, obviously, that she said she loved me. Especially after what happened this morning and the rest of the day, I know that it is not true."

Danny took a breath to speak again, probably just to tell him that was what he _wanted _to believe…but Steve barreled through. "And third, and most importantly," he pointed to the word on the screen, "Maggie."

"Yeah, who is Maggie?" Kono asked.

Steve shrugged. "I don't know. It's no one I've met, and I know that she doesn't have any sisters or other close family members. I'm thinking that's the main code. The other things were just indicators."

"A profession of love, huh?" Chin asked, shaking his head. "Some code."

Steve sighed. "Well, it definitely caught my attention."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"That was very cute," the man who had introduced himself before as Jason Marin told her as he paced the large wooden floor.

Catherine was satisfied to see that his arm was bandaged and held tightly to his torso by a sling. Perhaps she had broken his arm after all.

Though she knew he had gotten one up on her. Even though she couldn't feel it, and it was bandaged, she knew that the gunshot wound was much worse than she could probably imagine.

For now, though, the morphine they had pumped her full of was doing its job. She wasn't writhing in pain and she did not have the energy to try to escape. She was, however, resolved to try to get some answers.

"What do you want?" Catherine asked as clearly as she could through the drug haze. "Steve knows you won't let me live."

Jason turned to her, annoyed to hear her speaking. "I'm banking on love trumping reason today, Cathy."

"It won't," Catherine said knowingly.

"Hope all you'd like…" Jason sighed. "But I happen to know a thing or two about what men will do for beautiful women they love."

Catherine found it within herself to laugh at him, to make him doubt himself, to mislead him. She tried to speak clearly. "McGarrett doesn't love me," she said, as if it were the most ridiculous notion she'd ever heard. "McGarrett doesn't love women. He doesn't have it within himself to commit like that."

Jason was beginning to get angry. "I watched the two of you."

"Last night?" Catherine laughed, hoping it sounded genuine. "He wanted the get _laid_, is that so hard to understand?"

"The two of you are always together. You don't think I did my research?"

Catherine scoffed. "You saw what you wanted to believe. He's good in bed," she shrugged. "As long as he wants some of this, I'll give it to him. But it doesn't go any deeper than that." She paused for effect. "He won't come to rescue me."

"McGarrett would do anything for his team," Jason said more to himself than to her. "Everyone knows that."

"Well then maybe you should have thought about that before you targeted_ me_. I'm not part of his team; I'm a booty call. If you wanted Steve to desperately come to you, willing to do anything, you should have gone after Danny."

Jason was pacing faster, agitated.

Satisfied, Catherine rested her head against the wall and just let that all sink in. "Or who knows, maybe I'm wrong."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

As Kono ran cryptography programs on Catherine's message, Danny cautiously entered Steve's office, wary of the frenzy his partner was in as he tried to break the code himself.

McGarrett stared at the white board he had dragged into his office, Catherine's words written in stark black ink. He was convinced that a program wasn't going to solve this. This code was for _Steve_, so _he_ was going to break it.

"Steve?" Danny asked from behind him.

"I'm busy, Daniel."

"I know. You only have 48 minutes before your meet time with the crazy people. But I need you to turn around and talk to me for a second."

Steve turned with a sigh. "What."

"I need to ask you something."

"Your second is almost up," Steve warned.

"Before, when we were in the car, you said you needed to explain yourself. You never did. You only said that you didn't think you loved Catherine and then you didn't say anything else. Now I'm asking you to explain."

"No, Danny, I don't have time for this."

"Well you're about to make time. Because now we know that this is not about Catherine. This is about you. So any information you have when it comes to you and Catherine is going to help. Plus, I want to know ahead of time how stupid you're going to be about all of this."

Steve crossed his arms and hesitated for a long moment. "I don't treat her well," he admitted quietly.

"If she keeps coming back for seconds I would say that she thinks you treat her very well," Danny couldn't help but comment.

"I'm not going to explain this to you if you don't shut up."

Danny motioned a zipper across his mouth.

"I have walked away from Catherine so many times with the thought on my mind that I might not come back. There were some missions that I was convinced were going to be the end of me. I have been ready to die so many times, and I've always been okay with what I would be leaving behind.

"But today, when I realized that she was in danger, I tried to think to myself who I should tell. Who should be notified, should anything happen to her? …I didn't know the answer. And I'm not sure if that's because I tuned her out whenever she spoke of the other people in her life, or if it's because there _is_ no one else.

"I left her so many times without even saying goodbye. And I never really thought that meant anything. I never thought I owed her anything, because I thought that she had it made in some other life that didn't include me. I didn't even stop to consider that…that I might have been all she had."

Steve shifted his weight and found the courage to say what he had barely even dared to think.

"The possibility that I could be the closest thing she has to family scares me, Danny. I didn't have a family for a reason."

Danny allowed a moment to pass before he broke his silence. "But you let her into your life. You must have known what you were doing, didn't you?"

"I didn't. I wasn't thinking. And it wasn't serious. It wasn't supposed to mean anything." Steve now sat, head in hands. "But I woke up this morning and realized what I had. And now it's all being ripped out from under me before I can even get a firm grasp on it in the first place. Apparently this shit just happens to me and anyone I let in too close.

"You want to know the worst part, though?" Steve asked to no one in particular. "If I were the kind of man my father was, I'd walk away from her, knowing that being with me puts her in danger. But I'm selfish. I want her back because I want her to be with me. And only me."

"So, you love her, then?" Danny concluded for him. "Because sometimes it's really messed up, but it's really simple at the same time."

Steve gave Danny a very pointed look and Danny suddenly pulled back. "What?" he asked defensively as Steve advanced towards him, then past him, and straight to the whiteboard.

"Sometimes it's really simple," he said to himself, and began scrawling away on the board. "Ok, Danny, bear with me for a second," Steve said, getting ready to explain. "There's a really simple puzzle code that Cath and I used when we were working together in intelligence. It didn't have to be unbreakable, it just had to fly under the radar."

"Passing dirty notes in class, huh?" Danny guessed.

Steve took a moment to smile at Danny. Which was a good sign. He thought he'd figured it out. "So it was almost a game. There was one word that didn't fit with the rest of the note. That could be the key, and it was comprised of as many letters as the rest of the note had words."

Danny wasn't following, so Steve turned to the board. "Ok, so in Cath's message, the part I didn't understand was 'Maggie'. That's six letters. The part of her message that was six words long was when she said 'Just that I love you, Steven'."

_JUST THAT I LOVE YOU STEVEN_

E

"The code was really simple. The first letter of the word was from the key. The last letter was the same as the encoded word."

_JUST THAT I LOVE YOU STEVEN_

M - - T A - - T G G - - E I - U E- - - - N

"So this is the puzzle part, am I right?" Danny asked, trying to keep up.

"Yeah," Steve answered distractedly, his brows knitted together as he stared at the half-words. "The rest of it is all guess-work. That was half the fun. And sometimes it was embarrassing when I'd get it wrong because my brain was in the gutter."

Danny laughed, and left his partner alone to think.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Less than a minute later, Steve burst urgently through his office door, strapping on a few more guns than usual.

The heads of his team all turned expectantly.

"Your meet time isn't for another 45 minutes," Chin observed.

"I don't need the meet time at the docks," Steve said confidently as he holstered the last of his guns. "I figured out the code. Get your gear, get in the car, and follow me."

"This again. Perfect. It's my favorite thing, not knowing what's going on," Danny grumbled. But he was glad to get moving. They all were.

* * *

Please please review. I'm getting back on this story and need some encouragement!- Shash


End file.
